


the both of us come rising up

by sevdrag (seventhe)



Series: Sev's Commission Run 2019 [7]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Confused boys, M/M, Misunderstandings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-20
Updated: 2019-06-20
Packaged: 2020-05-15 10:20:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19293745
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seventhe/pseuds/sevdrag
Summary: Clint doesn't want to be Bucky's piece on the side. Bucky doesn't want to be Clint's stepping-stone to Steve. Natasha doesn't want to have to deal with this. Steve doesn't have any idea what's going on.Luckily, there's more common ground here than any of them think.





	the both of us come rising up

**Author's Note:**

  * For [estranqer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/estranqer/gifts).



> Commission from @mispelheim, who requested Winterhawk with the misunderstandings trope, with a couple additional prompts. Hope you enjoy! I wanted to take a slightly different angle from some of the other misunderstanding fics out there, while still hitting all the angst you wanted :)

———

The kiss was perfect, Clint thought hazily, letting Bucky back him up against the wall and opening his mouth to the feel of it: _god,_ Bucky’s lips were soft, and the press of his body up against Clint’s was just warm and hard and _right._ For a moment, Clint let his hands come up to tangle in Bucky’s hair, not to pull or push, just because it felt good. Bucky murmured something against his mouth and pressed even deeper, his tongue grazing against Clint’s, all hot and perfect in a way that made Clint wonder why he’d kept saying no.

Why had he kept saying no?

He must have made some little noise, because Bucky slowed down, sucking deeply at Clint’s lower lip before pulling back to press one, two, three breathless soft kisses onto his mouth, and pulled away smiling.

Clint was smiling, too, feeling almost blissful, because that was better than nice and he’d only been saying no because of Steve.

_Steve._

Holy fuck, Steve.

“Bucky,” Clint began, and Bucky ducked his head shyly, shrugging.

“That was nice,” Bucky said softly, and Clint found himself nodding along despite the awful feeling that was slowly spreading from the pit of his stomach. “You gotta know, Clint, I’ve been wanting to do that for a long time, right?”

Clint opened his mouth and nothing came out, nothing except a long slow exhale.

“Hey, you alright?” Bucky sounded more concerned than he should be, considering the monstrosity of Clint’s fuckup. “Clint?”

“Steve,” Clint managed to get out. “What about Steve, Bucky?”

Bucky frowned. “The fuck’s Steve got to do with this?”

“Steve,” Clint stammered, “You. I don’t. Don’t wanna fuck over Steve.”

“Where did Steve come into this?” Bucky’s frown was growing, wrinkles appearing on his forehead. “Stevie ain’t got nothin’ to do with this right now.”

“It isn’t right,” Clint breathed. It hurt - it fucking hurt, yes, because he and Bucky had been dancing around this for a while and Clint had a whopping crush the size of a bulldozer on the other man, despite his brain knowing better - but it was for the best. “Not really the right thing to do to Captain America, is it.”

Because Clint knew Bucky and Steve were a thing, half of each other’s wholes, all tangled and together to the end of the line, and here he’d been letting Bucky get away with a flirty little comment here and there because his heart was a _dumbass_ and he really didn’t want to be the homewrecker to a relationship that had spanned nearly a hundred years.

“Clint.” Bucky’s frown worked its way into an awkward sneer. “Why you bringing Steve into this?”

“Cause it’s not,” Clint said, and he just had to breathe through it because it hurt _so much_ to not be kissing Bucky back, but he was not that kind of person. Anymore. “Not fair. To either of you.”

“The fuck you mean?” Bucky hissed, and that was hurt plain as day on his face. What? Did he think Clint didn’t know about it? Did he think Clint just, you know, wouldn’t care? “Way you keep mentioning Stevie, I’m starting to think you’re fixed up on _him,_ now.”

“The _fuck?_ ” Clint hissed back, and yeah, they were a couple feet apart now, both flushed and angry with this and it had never hurt Clint so much to do the right thing. “How in the _fuck_ is that even a fair — what, you thought you could have both and just not tell him?”

“Both _what,_ ” Bucky said dangerously. “Both _what,_ Clint.”

But Clint was feeling this now, sharp and savage, because he was never good enough, and not just to others, even to _himself,_ cause he’d let himself feel all of this even without hope. “You just figured I’d be happy enough to get scraps, huh? Not worth much else.”

“Scraps—? Scraps of what, Barton, I swear to fucking god I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Bucky’s eyes narrowed. “Scraps of _Steve?”_

“Of whatever,” Clint said, suddenly beyond tired.

“Barton,” Bucky said, urgency in his voice. “Clint.” It drew him up, again, from the slouch he’d been dropping into. “Clint,” Bucky said, and all of the emotions Clint had ever hoped for were in his voice: all of the fondness, the sincerity, the want. “Do you want this?”

“Does it really matter,” Clint muttered, and turned to walk into the elevator and hit the button. “My floor, JARVIS.”

———

 _Fuck,_ Bucky thought. 

He thought he’d been right. He’d thought Clint had, if nothing else, been open to the opportunity of playing this hand of cards they’d been dealt between them, seeing where it led, even if it just led to a fold and a quiet exit. Bucky’d been good at this, once upon a time, had to be; he’d learnt to read expressions, both fellas and dames, and judge his own chances accordingly. Hadn’t never thought it was fair, but had still learned the language, and it just, well. Speaking of unfair. It was mad unfair he’d never learnt the proper language to give Clint Barton the talking to he deserved, especially cause he’d been all wired up in a goddamn chair for decades. God, he’d been crushing on Clint for _ages._

That look. That _look_ , at the end, that had shattered his composure, shook him down to his ankles. He had no idea how to reply, how to respond; it was a look in a different language, and yet Bucky’d known all the way down to his sinews and bones what Clint was sayin’, there.

His brain was trying to play back Clint’s words, but — this was part of himself he’d had to destroy to fully pull Hydra out of his brain, and he wasn’t sure he was sorry: the instant recall, the near-eidetic memory, it had all been overlaid on his own masterful listening skills, and while Bucky wished he could still remember the tone of Clint’s voice he was also happy, a bit, to know he wasn’t seeing it through Hydra-focused eyes. Even if it was incomplete. Even if it was inaccurate, full of holes, at least it wasn’t —

 _Fuck,_ Bucky thought again, and pressed his face into his pillow. 

What the fuck did Clint want, then, if it wasn’t — wasn’t this? Bucky had tried, for fuck’s sake, and he’d been _good_ at it for a long-ass time, and he’d thought all of Clint’s lingering looks and blushes and commentary had been a sign. Was Clint really just —? Was it Steve he was interested in, just moving in on Bucky as the first step? The grumpiest of his brain cells snorted at this absolute tragedy, but Bucky - as unstable as he was in his own skin, as awful as it was to be this sure of himself after years of confusion - was pretty sure, mostly sure, kind of sure that that wasn’t it.

So what the fuck, Clint?

Bucky closed his eyes and thought back to the moment: there had been a second where his eyes had met Clint’s and there had been nothing but want and acceptance. His lips had curved in, met Clint’s, and there was an entire rush of emotion as he’d gently backed Clint up against the wall and Clint had _let_ him, all glimmering with promise and open mouth and this low noise that was more an echo than a sound, and Bucky had for one glorious moment thought everything would be okay.

Fuck. He rolled over, tugged the blanket over his head, and closed his eyes.

———

 _In retrospect,_ Clint thought, _this was all my fault._

He hadn’t meant to get so fucking _involved._ It was just that by the time Bucky had surrendered himself at the Avengers headquarters and he’d been given enough time and solitude to kind of find some sort of baseline instead and come out all hesitant and careful and downright _cute_ with it, Clint couldn’t help but care. Anyone who went through that and still gave a shit about the people around him was, honestly, someone Clint wanted to be friends with.

And it hadn’t helped as Bucky had slowly gathered up the ashes and scraps of his memories and made something new, something that made Steve guffaw in terribly loud laughter, and Natasha blink slowly, which was her version of a fond smile, and even Tony would quirk his lips occasionally before remembering he was supposed to be angry. 

Bucky hadn’t been Clint’s to claim, even as Clint had tried to do so in his own dumb, subtle ways. He’d locked into Bucky at the range, initiating endlessly ridiculous shooting contests between them, competing jealously against the new obstacles Tony had to set up when they creamed the existing courses, always making sure everything was peak and on-form and top-performance whenever he was there shooting. It was exhausting, because Clint knew he was a garbage bag of a human being, and he only dared show his best and brightest around Bucky, because in his head competence was a clear prerequisite for hanging around with a person that amazing. 

The problem was that Clint Barton’s best wasn’t anywhere near Steve Rogers’ normal, and for a while Clint figured he had Bucky distracted on the newness of it all, a sense of curiosity, but. As it turned out, Clint was only a headliner when performing - a lesson he’d learnt long ago - and couldn’t keep anyone’s attention when he put down the glitter and the glam and the spotlight and just turned into normal old Clint Barton. 

And it made sense cause Barnes must have seen all the tricks, over decades of living, of having seen into horrible depths and all kinds of shit Clint cringed away at understanding, and that’s probably what made him not even worth looking at. Steve could take it. Captain America had come from the same time, through the same barriers, and he knew what it would take to put Bucky back on solid ground. 

That didn’t mean any of this felt good.

———

A soft noise, like something falling onto the carpet, woke him. Bucky was, at least, used to the tower enough to know there was a 75% chance it wasn’t something coming to kill him — and somehow while he struggled to wake up, the remaining part of his analytical brain - the bits he hadn’t ruined by tearing out Hydra - told him that this was a familiar sound, a familiar footstep.

“Яша,” said Natalia Romanovna. “Get up.”

Bucky had been so eager to break free from all of his mental bonds that he’d sort of torn up the landscape he needed to make sense of the Black Widow. Had she been a child he trained? Had she been a lover he’d mourned? He’d been too happy to yank all of it out of his head and replace it with normal neural baselines, and he’d never been able to tell whether she thought it was a gift or a curse.

“Why?” It was a genuine question; he and Natalia had ended up settling into something that was at least friendly if not friends, and she rarely if ever woke him out of a deep sleep to do anything: normally she left that to Steve. Bucky was a little bit curious as to what brought her into his own space to wake him up.

“I’ll tell you in a bit,” said Natalia, and there was amusement in her voice in equal portions to the hesitance he was used to hearing from her. “Get dressed to spar, but you can eat breakfast first.”

Bucky groaned, exaggerating it largely, but he did get up and put on his sparring gear before heading out to the shared kitchen. He didn’t even have any idea what time it was - the Avengers compound didn’t really follow normal time, what with Stark and the nightmares and the lighting that just _adjusted_ and the spaces set aside for sleep vs rest - but he managed to eat one of the stupid protein bar things that everyone kept shoving at him and Stevie like they were going to _die_ without them. He also had a cup of coffee, even after he determined it was something like 2300, because it made sense to his brain. 

He was still tingling with this vague sense of — hurt, really, but also just an underlying disappointment, as if he’d wanted to expect more but ended up cut back by reality. Whatever. It was time to see what the Widow wanted to tell him.

It wasn’t even a big deal when he’d figured out that this was her method of communication. Other people spoke with words, but someone like the Widow - someone who grew up in that same terrible place, where all words were specifically chosen and emotion was a plaything for children - spoke in the only language she was still fluent in, which was her body. Bucky had talked to her like this before, at some point in his recovery where she’d been worried about Steve and whether Bucky was truly good or bad or him, and he’d saved that memory up and over any queasy half-dreams he thought he knew about her. Old data was maybe useful, but new data trumped everything.

So Bucky rolled into the sparring court, beneath the net and over the raised wall of mats meant to be a small deterrent, and came to his feet approximately three meters from the Widow. She was still wrapping her hands, which showed no signs of her Widow’s Bites, or any other technology; Bucky took it in, but the instincts at the edges of his consciousness said not to ignore her, said she might have things hidden. Bucky wasn’t sure if he was here as an opponent or a conversant or just as a target that could take a beating from the Widow — and while all were fair, legitimate reasons, he found a strange anxiety rising in his chest, no matter what.

“Яша,” Natalia said. “Зимний Солдат.” She let her gaze line him up, top to bottom, and then gestured. “We should talk.”

“Right,” Bucky said, and despite the fact that he still felt relatively empty, as if someone had drained most of the energy out of him, he gave her a grin; he was fairly sure she saw through it, but she allowed it, with a slight nod. “Let’s dance.”

They settled into an easy warmup, mixing punches and grabs with stretches, all slow and deliberate. It felt nice, and Bucky felt some of the tension melt away as his muscles warmed to it, the dull pleasing pain of the workout a low hum that silenced some of the noise in the back of his head. They progressed from the warmup to real sparring with a quick glance at each other, and suddenly Bucky was grappling with Natalia for real, having to use force and his bulk against her quick strikes.

“So,” she started, dodging a blow from his metal arm and sweeping low with a kick he had to leap to avoid. “I’m assuming by Clint’s sorry state that you’ve rejected him.”

Bucky _jerked,_ and Natalia went to take advantage of it; he twisted, pulling her with him, and as he spun away he hissed, “Natalia.”

“Таша,” she corrected him. “And I’m allowed to meddle. Clint’s my family.”

“Natasha,” Bucky said, deliberately punctuating each syllable with a quick strike for her to block. “I didn’t reject anything. Clint walked away from _me._ ”

“Hmm.” She spun, and Bucky caught her legs this time; suddenly inspired, rather than throwing her off, he stepped into her spin and launched her into the air. She let out a breath of air - similar to a laugh - and tucked into a twist to land in a predatory crouch. “That was fun,” she said, stalking around Bucky again. “But what in the world do you mean, Clint said no?”

Bucky sagged for a minute, and Natasha took advantage, a series of quick little jabs he worked on blocking with the metal arm entirely. “He said,” he got out through gritted teeth, trying to get her off of her feet, “something about Steve, then said this wasn’t _right,_ then he fuckin’ _left._ ” Each word got emphasized by some kind of motion, until Bucky found he’d backed Natasha up against the net. She gave him an approving nod, and dropped her hands.

“I asked him if he wanted this,” Bucky said, between panting breaths, his shoulders sagging again. “And he said, does it even matter.”

“Ah, Клинтка,” Natasha said. “I feel like there’s a mistake here. Thank you for the spar, James, but I need to go.”

Bucky watched her leave, feeling a bit better overall from the exercise, but more confused than ever.

———

“Clint,” called a voice, cheerfully, after Clint ignored the third round of knocking, “I will actually pound this door down if you don’t let me in.”

It was Steve. 

Well, great. He could get yelled at for trying to steal another dude’s dude, possibly punched in the face, and that could just round up what might be the worst day ever.

He crawled out from under his blanket pile, not even bothering to shed them all; he pulled one down over his head like a hood and wrapped himself up in it tightly as if it could stave off the verbal beatdown he was about to face.

Instead, when he opened the door, a smiling Steve Rogers extended an open beer to him and stepped into his room, maneuvering around Blanket-Clint as if he’d expected something like that. “Thanks,” Steve said, looking around curiously. “I wasn’t looking forward to another lecture on breaking doors.”

“Look,” Clint said, after accepting the beer and taking a long swallow, “I’m sorry. It won’t happen again, I promise. He’s all yours.”

Steve gave Clint this little head-tilt of confusion, which would have been hilarious in _any other situation_ , and frowned. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Bucky,” Clint said, and he felt his shoulders sag again. His bare feet took him to the couch, and he collapsed into the corner of it, pulling the blanket hood down until it was hiding some of his face.

“Yeah, I’m here to talk to you about Bucky,” Steve said, still with plenty of friendly cheer in his voice. “He’s having a bad day, and I thought maybe you could get him to do one of those ridiculous shooting challenges you do or something? Spending time with you always cheers him up.”

And oh what the _fuck,_ here was Bucky’s man asking Bucky’s _other man_ \- if they’d ever been anything, which really, they hadn’t - to cheer up his boyfriend? On the day Bucky’d made it clear that Clint wouldn’t ever be anything other than the guy on the side? Jesus. This really was his worst day ever.

“Any other day I’d be glad to,” he said, “but today I just — can’t.” After a pause, he added sullenly, “I’m probably not the guy you want to be asking for that job, anyway. Not anymore.”

The couch creaked beneath the exceptional bulk of Steve Rogers, and a big hand came into Clint’s line of sight to tug the blanket hoodie away from his face. “Clint,” Steve said, his voice now gone to concern, “are you alright?”

“ _Oh my god,_ ” Clint said. “No. No, I am really not alright, and I’m not sure why you’re dodging the issue, although I appreciate not getting punched in the face.” _I already got punched in the heart today,_ he thought.

Steve blinked, then picked up his own beer and took a very long and contemplative sip. “Clint,” he said, very carefully. “What the hell?”

Shit. If Bucky hadn’t told him, then — then what? Clint was just _nothing?_ Not even worth _mentioning_ to the significant other that anything had happened? Did Bucky really think he was this much of a trash fire, so absolutely worthless that kissing him didn’t even _count as cheating?_

And did _he_ really want to be the one to tell Captain America his lover had locked lips with the waste of space sitting next to him on the couch?

“Nothin’,” Clint said, and then as he turned his face into the couch and pulled the blanket back over his head, he mumbled: “Go ask Bucky.”

——— 

Bucky had taken to the treadmill after Natalia - Наташа - had left, and he wasn’t sure whether it was helping or not. The burn in his muscles was a pleasant distraction, but the monotony of it wasn’t helping him keep his thoughts away from Clint. He was trying to focus on the miles, on the repetitive motion, trying to fall into some kind of meditative state; instead, he was panting a little, and his brain just kept throwing up replays of that one kiss, in some sorta technicolor high definition rendering. The contrast between the two was a bit off-putting. 

He heard the familiar footsteps over the whining of the treadmill and the sound of his own feet hitting the rubber. “Stevie,” he warned. “I’m not in the mood right now.”

“Tough,” said Steve, as he reached up and hit the pause button on the treadmill. “Care to tell me why you and Hawkeye are both depressingly upset on the same day, so I can’t use you to cheer the other one up?” He paused, and then added carefully, “And why he said I should ask you?”

“God damnit, Steve.” Bucky took this as a sign from above that it was time to stop running - huh, 24 miles wasn’t all that bad - and jumped off the treadmill, heading over to the rack of clean towels next to the water cooler. “Sometimes people fuck up, alright? Keep your punk head out of it.”

“Noooo,” Steve said slowly, drawing it out. “No, I don’t think I will this time. I talked to Natasha, Buck.”

“What the _fuck._ ” There was a bit of a whine in his voice, but Bucky didn’t really care much. “Does everybody on the team know about my big mistake now? Are you gonna make an announcement later? Have JARVIS give a live replay? Jesus, Stevie, it’s not your business.”

“It shouldn’t be,” Steve agreed, grave. “But I’m pretty sure you’re gonna be happy we made it our business.”

“The fuck does that mean?” Bucky threw the towel into the hamper and poured himself a glass of this fancy-ass electrolyte-replenishing vitamin-added blah blah cucumber and shit water. 

“Clint thinks you and I are together.” 

Bucky frowned against the glass as he chugged it down, then went to refill it. “No he doesn’t. Why the fuck would he think that?”

“I feel like Barton’s brain is its own category of _why,_ ” Steve said, and now there was a little twinkle of humor in his eye as well. “But he does think that.”

“I have been very clearly hitting on him for _months_ now, Steve,” Bucky blurted out, because it felt like Steve was having some fun at his expense. “And only him. I’m certainly not flirting with _you._ ”

“Buck,” Steve said, spreading his fingers in some sort of apology. “You can ask him why, I sure as hell don’t know. Just think about it. He thinks we’re in some decades-long star-crossed romance, okay? Wouldn’t you be a little hesitant to return a guy’s flirting if you thought he was taken?”

“But he has been,” Bucky began, and then stopped. Cause it was a little bit true: Clint would flirt back sometimes, getting right up in Bucky’s face, but then he’d… back off, somewhat, put some space and difference between them. It certainly explained why Bucky had felt like it was taking months to get anywhere. 

“He never, like, asked,” he said instead, hearing the sulky note to his voice and not really caring.

“Look.” Steve put a hand on his shoulder. “Nat says Clint’s lying around upstairs thinking you just wanted some fun on the side and feeling eternally guilty for spoiling the ‘romance novel love story’, I guess. You wanna go talk to him?”

“No,” Bucky grumbled, but he did.

———

Clint only opened the door cause it was Tasha’s special secret knock, but when he did, he found that she’d betrayed him. 

“There you go, boys,” she said, shoving a somewhat sulky-looking Bucky into the room. “Bye.”

The door shut behind her and Clint just kind of stared at Bucky’s face and subconsciously pulled all his blankets closer.

“That’s why you were talking about Steve,” Bucky said suddenly, his gaze coming up to meet Clint’s with the force of a laser. “That’s why you were babbling. For a second there I thought you’d just been using me to get to him.”

“What?” The sheer ridiculousness was enough to get him to answer. “Steve? Me and Steve? Christ.” He tugged at something and sighed when he felt fabric slip off his shoulder. “I thought I was being pretty obvious,” he muttered.

“Yeah, well so did I,” Bucky growled, and great, they were gonna fight about this too.

Clint didn’t really have it in him anymore. “Fine, just yell what you’re gonna yell, I get the message.” He turned to fully face Bucky, realizing he was wearing three blankets and a Snuggie. Oh well. _Fuck it._ He shrugged.

“Clint,” Bucky began, slowly, and his gaze suddenly turned _sharp_ on Clint, laser-eyes again, and Clint couldn’t have turned away if he’d wanted to. “Steve and I aren’t together.”

“Oh,” Clint shot back, cause he was gonna shoot off all the defensive weaponry he could. “Like I’m supposed to believe you went and dumped him for my garbage ass?”

“Clint,” Bucky repeated, and Clint paused in his rage, because it almost sounded like pleading. “Steve and I have never been together. At all.” Bucky swallowed, and then added, “We have never been romantically or physically ...like that.”

“So, what?” Clint shrugged violently beneath all of his blanket layers. “So you’re saying I’m not just some _guy on the side_ to entertain you when Steve’s gone? Like I should believe you meant it for real?”

“Yeah,” Bucky said, and swallowed again. His voice had gone calm, and there was some kind of acceptance on his face. “Yeah, you should.”

Clint swallowed back whatever had been sitting in his throat to say and sort of stared. Bucky’s eyes were serious, and a little fond, and there was something twisting in his stomach, something strangely warm. All Clint could say was, after a long thick moment, “Yeah?” It sounded stupid, even to him.

“Yeah, Clint.” Bucky paused, sucking on his bottom lip for a second. “Although I gotta say, it kinda hurts that you think I’m the type of guy who leads a fella on when he ain’t looking for anything serious.”

“What else was I supposed to think?” Clint asked, although it sounded more defensive and sulky than he liked. 

“You know,” Bucky said conversationally, “I’ve been trying real hard to be a good guy these days. That kinda stings.”

“That isn’t,” Clint started, suddenly feeling guilty; he dropped one of the blankets as he made a hasty gesture. “I wasn’t really thinking… that, consciously. I just figured…” He looked away and shrugged again. “Why would anybody who spends time around Steve Rogers ever really want anything to do with me?”

“Wow,” said Bucky, and that wasn’t the reaction he’d been expecting at all. “Wow, Clint. You’re seriously… Okay.”

Bucky slowly stepped over to Clint, eyes locked on his the entire time, and began slowly peeling the blankets away. Clint wanted to protest, but it was weirdly intimate, like the world’s least explicit strip tease. He let Bucky pull them off and drop them to the floor, standing motionless and waiting. 

“I need you to be honest,” Bucky said, and he was so very close; his eyes locked on Clint’s, his mouth in a somewhat tense smile. Clint could smell the metal of his arm and something vaguely woodsy that might be his hair. It felt overwhelming, to be this close, and his heart was beating so intensely he thought it might explode.

Bucky very, very carefully lifted his hand and cupped Clint’s cheek. “Hey,” he said, his mouth softening into a crooked smile. “Clint. Do you want this?”

Clint wasn’t even sure how to answer, because his heart was in his throat and Bucky looked so very genuine, and if this was real he wanted it very much, please, and right now. He didn’t speak, so he leaned in, slowly, and then let Bucky’s hand guide their lips together.

It was the same - that precious, almost painful feeling, when everything was perfect for just a fraction of a second - and Clint sighed into it, Bucky’s mouth opening into his. They moved together, and Clint let Bucky tilt his head, and suddenly there was _heat_ as they matched up, tongues sliding against each other. Bucky made a noise deep in his throat and Clint needed _more_ of it; one hand came up to tangle in Bucky’s hair, the other resting in the small of Bucky’s back, pulling him closer.

Bucky pulled away, and Clint chased his lips, which made Bucky laugh: a deep laugh, one that Clint could feel pressed all the way up his body, which he found he liked intensely. “Hey,” he said, grinning at Clint like a loon. “Just to be clear. I’m gonna need you to say it.”

Clint opened his mouth, but vulnerability was hard, and he’d already made an ass of himself _so hard_ today that all he wanted was to go back to bed. “I,” he started, and then said, “I’m sorry,” because he was genuinely sorry for assuming things about Bucky, and it was easier to say.

Bucky chuckled and shook his head. “Okay,” he said, with something raw in his voice. “I’ll go first.” He brought his hand up to Clint’s face again and Clint couldn’t help but turn into it, leaning his cheek into Bucky’s palm. “I want to try this, Clint,” Bucky said, his voice so soft it was nearly a whisper. “I want you. I wanna see what happens.”

Clint squeezed his eyes shut against the sudden rush of emotion: fear, joy, guilt, an embarrassingly strong rush of hope. When he opened his eyes again they were stinging, and Bucky’s face had closed off a bit, as if he were suddenly unsure of the answer. As if Clint could say anything else?

“Me too,” he managed to say, finally, leaning forward so that his forehead rested against Bucky’s. “I want… this. I just never let myself consider it.” Just saying it out loud made him close his eyes again, until Bucky’s fingers tightened against his jaw and he opened them again to see something blazing and raw in Bucky’s eyes.

“We’ll talk about that later,” Bucky said, nearly angry with the force of it. “We gotta talk about a lot of this stuff. Just… just say you wanna try it, Clint. With me. I need to hear it.” His voice was rough at the end of it and Clint carefully brought his hands up to hold Bucky’s hips, thumbs rubbing gently over Bucky’s t-shirt.

“Yeah, Buck,” Clint said, and his mouth started to smile at it before he could do anything else. “Let’s try this. Being together. I want to.”

“That’ll work,” Bucky breathed, and then he was pulling Clint back into a kiss, gentle except for the emotion behind it, becoming gently _relentless_ as Bucky worked at Clint’s lips, tongue tracing his. Clint just tried to keep up, a little stunned and a little giddy and a lot of other emotions welling up that he honestly couldn’t keep track of. Bucky’s mouth on his was a _revelation._ God, he wanted this.

Bucky pulled away slowly, softly, still so gentle with Clint as if he was afraid he’d — afraid he’d be rejected again, Clint realized, and he followed Bucky far enough to press a few quick easy kisses to his mouth, his cheek. Bucky was smiling up at him, his grin crooked and wild, and Clint was momentarily stunned by the realization that he could, in fact, have this. The grin he returned was probably equally as cheesy, and Clint didn’t even care in the slightest.

“That’ll work,” he murmured back at Bucky, and was rewarded with another kiss.

 

**Author's Note:**

> you're all lucky i deleted the very drunken Russian rant that was in the middle of this fic. Thanks to the BDBD for the sprints!


End file.
